delphimvcframework/README.md

![DelphiMVCFramework Logo](docs/dmvcframework_logofacebook.png)

# DelphiMVCFramework 3.1.0-lithium is [here](https://github.com/danieleteti/delphimvcframework/releases/tag/v3.1.0-lithium)!

DelphiMVCFramework is the most popular Delphi project on github!

Daniele is working on the [DelphiMVCFramework Handbook](https://leanpub.com/delphimvcframework)! Stay tuned!

## How to correctly get the source
It is not needed to download the git repository. Just download the [latest version as zip file](https://github.com/danieleteti/delphimvcframework/releases/latest) and you are ok.
If you want to partecipate to the testing phase (which usually contains brand new features) you can get the [latest Release Candidate version](https://github.com/danieleteti/delphimvcframework/releases).
Take in mind that, even if RCs are usually very stable, they are still not ready for production utilization.

## What users says about DMVCFramework

>"DMVCFramework is a great framework. It's very intuitive, fast, easy to use, actually there is nothing more to ask for." -- Samir

>"Wow! To do that in J2EE it takes 2 days" -- a training participant after a 5 minutes demo.

>"I'm starting with the DMVCFramework and I'm finding it fantastic, congratulations for the project!" -- Rafael

>"I'm looking at DMVCFramework project in it works great - for my use case scenarios is much better than *'Similar commercial product'*."  -- Luka

>"It's fantastic! Just define your entities and you are up and running in 5 minutes. Nothing comparable on the market." -- Marco

>"The best framework for creating web servers with Delphi! It is very easy to create Delphi servers and publish Apis and Rest resources.
Congratulations to Daniele Teti and all the staff for the excellent work!" -- Marcos N.
  

## DelphiMVCFramework Main Features

  * Simple to use, check the ["Getting Started: 5 minutes guide"](https://danieleteti.gitbooks.io/delphimvcframework/content/chapter_getting_started.html) and you will be up and running in 5 minutes or less!
  * [Project Roadmap](roadmap.md) is always public
	* More than 40 samples to learn all the features and be proficient and productive
  * RESTful (RMM Level 3) compliant
  * JSON-RPC 2.0 Support with automatic objects remotization
  * Stable and solid, used by small/mid/big projects since 2010
  * Very fast! (3.x is 60% faster than the 2.x)
  * Support group at https://www.facebook.com/groups/delphimvcframework with more than 2100 active members
  * Can be used in load balanced environment
  * Wizard for the Delphi IDE. It makes DelphiMVCFramework even more simple to use!
  * Optional session support
  * JSON Web Token Support (JWT)
  * Extendable using middlewares (simple hooks to handle request/response)
  * Flexible yet simple to use, authorization/authentication framework based on industry standards.
    * HTTP Basic Authentication
    * JWT Authentication
    * Custom Authentication
  * CORS support
  * Controllers inheritance! You can define your own base controller and inherith from it.
  * Fancy URL with parameter mappings
  * Specialied renders to generate text, HTML, JSON.
  * Powerful and customizable mapper to serialize/deserialize data.
  * Can be packaged as stand alone server, apache module (XE6 or better) and ISAPI dll
  * Integrated RESTClient
  * Works with XE7, XE8, Delphi 10 Seattle, Delphi 10.1 Berlin, Delphi 10.2 Tokyo, Delphi 10.3 Rio
  * Works on Linux (Delphi 10.2 Tokyo or better)
  * Completely unit tested
  * There is a sample for each functionality
  * There is a complete set of trainings about it, but the samples are included in the project
  * Server side generated pages using Mustache (https://mustache.github.io/) for Delphi (https://github.com/synopse/dmustache)
  * Specific trainings are available (email to `professionals@bittime.it` for a date and a place)
  * Messaging extension using ServerSentEvents
  * Automatic documentation through `/system/describeserver.info`
  * Driven by its huge community (Facebook group https://www.facebook.com/groups/delphimvcframework)
  * Semantic Versioning
  * Simple and [documented](docs/ITDevCON%202013%20-%20Introduction%20to%20DelphiMVCFramework.pdf)
  * Continuosly tested for Delphi versions incompatibilities by the proud [compatibility mantainers](COMPATIBILITY_MANTAINERS.MD) 

## What's Cooking in the Lab

### DelphiMVCFramework 3.1.1-beryllium (currently in `RC` phase)
- New! Added SQLGenerator and RQL compiler for PostgreSQL and MSSQLServer (in addition to MySQL, MariaDB, Firebird and Interbase)
- Improved! Greatly improved support for [HATEOAS](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HATEOAS) in renders. Check `TRenderSampleController.GetPeople_AsObjectList_HATEOS` and all the others actions end with `HATEOS` in `renders.dproj` sample)

```delphi
//Now is really easy to add "_links" property automatically for each collection element while rendering
Render<TPerson>(People, True,
    procedure(const APerson: TPerson; const Links: IMVCLinks)
    begin
      Links.AddRefLink
        .Add(HATEOAS.HREF, '/people/' + APerson.ID.ToString)
        .Add(HATEOAS.REL, 'self')
        .Add(HATEOAS._TYPE, 'application/json')
        .Add('title', 'Details for ' + APerson.FullName);
      Links.AddRefLink
        .Add(HATEOAS.HREF, '/people')
        .Add(HATEOAS.REL, 'people')
        .Add(HATEOAS._TYPE, 'application/json');
    end);

		
//Datasets have a similar anon method to do the same thing
Render(lDM.qryCustomers, False,
  procedure(const DS: TDataset; const Links: IMVCLinks)
  begin
	Links.AddRefLink
	  .Add(HATEOAS.HREF, '/customers/' + DS.FieldByName('cust_no').AsString)
	  .Add(HATEOAS.REL, 'self')
	  .Add(HATEOAS._TYPE, 'application/json');
	Links.AddRefLink
	  .Add(HATEOAS.HREF, '/customers/' + DS.FieldByName('cust_no').AsString + '/orders')
	  .Add(HATEOAS.REL, 'orders')
	  .Add(HATEOAS._TYPE, 'application/json');
  end);

//Single object rendering allows HATEOAS too!
Render(lPerson, False,
  procedure(const AObject: TObject; const Links: IMVCLinks)
  begin
	Links.AddRefLink
	  .Add(HATEOAS.HREF, '/people/' + TPerson(AObject).ID.ToString)
	  .Add(HATEOAS.REL, 'self')
	  .Add(HATEOAS._TYPE, TMVCMediaType.APPLICATION_JSON);
	Links.AddRefLink
	  .Add(HATEOAS.HREF, '/people')
	  .Add(HATEOAS.REL, 'people')
	  .Add(HATEOAS._TYPE, TMVCMediaType.APPLICATION_JSON);
  end);
	
```	

- Better packages organization (check `packages` folder)
- New! `TMVCActiveRecord.Count` method (e.g. `TMVCActiveRecord.Count(TCustomer)` returns the number of records for the entity mapped by the class `TCustomer`)
- Change! `TMVCACtiveRecord.GetByPK<T>` raises an exception if the record is not found
- New! `contains` clause has been added in the RQL compiler for Firebird and Interbase
- New! `TMVCAnalyticsMiddleware` to do automatic analytics on the API (generates a CSV file). Based on an idea by Nirav Kaku (https://www.facebook.com/nirav.kaku). Check the sample in `\samples\middleware_analytics\`
- New! `TMVCActiveRecord.DeleteAll` deletes all the records from a table
- New! `TMVCActiveRecord.DeleteRQL` deletes records using an `RQL` expression as `where` clause.
- New! Microsoft SQLServer Support in ActiveRecord and RQL (thanks to one of the biggest Delphi based company in Italy which heavily uses DMVCFramework)
- New! SQLite Support in ActiveRecord and RQL, so that MVCActiveRecord can be used also for Delphi mobile projects!
- Improved! `ActiveRecordShowCase` sample is much better now.
- Improved! In case of unhandled exception `TMVCEngine` is compliant with the default response content-type (usually it did would reply using `text/plain`).
- Fix! [issue184](https://github.com/danieleteti/delphimvcframework/issues/184).
- Breaking Change! In `MVCActiveRecord` attribute `MVCPrimaryKey` has been removed and merged with `MVCTableField`, so now `TMVCActiveRecordFieldOption` is a set of `foPrimaryKey`, `foAutoGenerated`, `foTransient` (check `activerecord_showcase.dproj` sample).
- Added! New overloads for all the Log\* calls. Now it is possibile to call `LogD(lMyObject)` to get logged `lMyObject` as JSON (custom type serializers not supported in log).
- Fixed! [issue164](https://github.com/danieleteti/delphimvcframework/issues/164)
- Fixed! [issue182](https://github.com/danieleteti/delphimvcframework/issues/182)
- New! `StrDict(array of string, array of string)` function allows to render a dictionary of strings in a really simple way. See the following action sample.
```delphi
procedure TMy.GetPeople(const Value: Integer);
begin
  if Value mod 2 <> 0 then
  begin
    raise EMVCException.Create(HTTP_STATUS.NotAcceptable, 'We don''t like odd numbers');
  end;
  Render(
    StrDict(
      ['id', 'message'],
      ['123', 'We like even numbers, thank you for your ' + Value.ToString]
    ));
end;
```
- New! Custom Exception Handling (Based on work of [David Moorhouse](https://github.com/fastbike)). Sample "custom_exception_handling" show how to use it.
- Improved! Exceptions rendering while using MIME types different to `application/json`.
- Improved! JSONRPC Automatic Object Publishing can not invoke inherited methods if not explicitely defined with `MVCInheritable` attribute.
- Improved! Datasets serialization speed improvement. In some case the performace [improves of 2 order of magnitude](https://github.com/danieleteti/delphimvcframework/issues/205#issuecomment-479513158). (Thanks to https://github.com/pedrooliveira01)
- New! Added `in` operator in RQL parser (Thank you to [João Antônio Duarte](https://github.com/joaoduarte19) for his initial work on this)
- New! Added `TMVCActiveRecord.Count<T>(RQL)` to count record based on RQL criteria
- New! Calling `<jsonrpcendpoint>/describe` returns the methods list available for that endpoint.
- New! Experimental (alpha stage) support for Android servers!
- New! Added support for `X-HTTP-Method-Override` to work behind corporate firewalls.
- New Sample! Server in DLL
- Improved! New consts defined in `HTTP_STATUS` to better describe the http status response.
- Improved! Now Firebird RQL' SQLGenerator can include primary key in "createinsert" if not autogenerated.
- New! Added support for `TArray<String>` and `TArray<Integer>` in default json serializer (Thank you [Pedro Oliveira](https://github.com/pedrooliveira01))
- Improved JWT Standard Compliance! Thanks to [Vinicius Sanchez](https://github.com/viniciussanchez) for his work on [issue #241](https://github.com/danieleteti/delphimvcframework/issues/241)
- Improved! DMVCFramework now has 130+ unit tests that checks its funtionalities at each build!
- New Installation procedure! Just open the project group, build all and install the design-time package (which is `dmvcframeworkDT`)


|Delphi Version|Project Group|
|---|---|
|Delphi 10.3 Rio| `packages\d103\dmvcframework_group.groupproj`|
|Delphi 10.2 Tokyo| `packages\d102\dmvcframework_group.groupproj`|
|Delphi 10.1 Berlin| `packages\d101\dmvcframework_group.groupproj`|
|Delphi 10.0 Seattle| `packages\d100\dmvcframework_group.groupproj`|
|Delphi XE8| `packages\dxe8\dmvcframework_group.groupproj`|
|Delphi XE7| `packages\dxe7\dmvcframework_group.groupproj`|

### DelphiMVCFramework 3.1.0-lithium
- New! Added `TMVCActiveRecord` framework (check sample `activerecord_showcase` and `activerecord_crud`)
- New! Added `TMVCActiveRecordController` (check sample `activerecord_crud`)
- Automatic permissions handling for `TMVCActiveRecordController` (check sample `activerecord_crud`)
- EntityProcessor for `TMVCActiveRecordController` (check sample `activerecord_crud`)
- `Config[TMVCConfigKey.FallbackResource]` is served only if request path is empty or `/`.
- New! Now the JSON-RPC executor provides methods to handle HTTP headers for JSON-RPC requests and notifications.
- `TDataSetHolder` is a new render that is able to render a dataset with a set of custom metadata (eg `count`,`page` etc). Check [issue #137](https://github.com/danieleteti/delphimvcframework/issues/137)
- `404` and `500` status code returns always a `text/plain` content-type
- Refactored ISAPI sample
- Speed improvement! Removed enhanced visibility for action methods. Now only public and published methods can be used as actions.
- `TMVCController.Create` is `virtual`! Now on your base controllers can be even more powerful!
- New! Added `MAX_REQUEST_SIZE` for limiting the size of the incoming HTTP requests. IDE Expert is updated too!
- New! Added method `TMVCJsonDataObjectsSerializer.ListToJsonArray`
- New! `TMVCResponse` for handle generic (non error) response
- New! `TMVCErrorResponse` for handle generic error response
- New! Added class `TMVCActiveRecordList` used in the manual `TMVCActiveRecord` programming
- New! Added `gzip` compression support in addition to `deflate` in `TCompressionMiddleware`
- FIX for [issue #143](https://github.com/danieleteti/delphimvcframework/issues/143)
- FIX for [issue #141](https://github.com/danieleteti/delphimvcframework/issues/141)
- Removed deprecated methods in `IRESTResponse`
- FIX misspelled header name in `IRESTResponse`
- New! Added `gzip` and `deflate` support in `TRestClient` when reading responses
- `TCompressionMiddleware` has been renamed in `TMVCCompressionMiddleware`
- New! `TMVCCompressionMiddleware` is added by IDE Expert by default
- Removed the old JSON serializer based on `System.JSON.pas', now the only available JSON serializer is based on [JsonDataObjects](https://github.com/ahausladen/JsonDataObjects) parser (Thank you Andreas Hausladen).
- Changed! Custom Types Serializer *must* be registered by media-type only, without charset definition (e.g. just `application/json` and not `application/json;charset=utf-8`)
- Changed! `IMVCTypeSerializer` is more powerful and simple to use!
- Sending wrongly formatted JSON now returns a more correctly `400 Bad Request` and not `500 Internal Server Error` as in the previous versions
- New! Support for Spring4d nullable types (check `samples\renders_spring4d_nullables`)
- New! `TMVCJSONRPCPublisher` allows to easily expose plain Delphi objects (and even datamodules) through a JSON-RPC 2.0 interface!
- *Breaking Change!* The JSON RPC Client layer is now interface based.

## Roadmap
DelphiMVCFramework roadmap is always updated as-soon-as the features planned are implemented. Check the roadmap [here](roadmap.md).

## Trainings, consultancy or custom development service
As you know, good support on open source software is a must for professional users.
If you need trainings, consultancy or custom developments on DelphiMVCFramework, send an email to *dmvcframework at bittime dot it*. Alternatively you can send a request using the [contacts forms](http://www.bittimeprofessionals.it/contatti) on [bittimeprofessionals website](http://www.bittimeprofessionals.it). bit Time Professionals is the company behind DelphiMVCFramework, al the main developers works there.


### Using mapping framework in Delphi Starter Edition
A lot of users ask about it, now is possible to use the mapper framework also in Delphi Started Edition. To enable the "StarterEditionMode" open ```sources\dmvcframework.inc``` and remove the dot (.) after the curly brace in the following line

```{.$DEFINE STARTEREDITION}```

become

```{$DEFINE STARTEREDITION}```

## Release Notes
**3.0.0 (hydrogen)**
  - First release of the 3.0.0 version

**2.1.3 (lithium)**
  - FIX https://github.com/danieleteti/delphimvcframework/issues/64
  - Added unit tests to avoid regressions
  
**2.1.2 (helium)**
  - FIX for Delphi versions who don't have ```TJSONBool``` (Delphi XE8 or older)
  - Added new conditional define in dmvcframework.inc: JSONBOOL (defined for Delphi Seattle+)

**2.1.1 (hydrogen)**
  - Updated the IDE Expert to show the current version of the framework
  - FIX to the mapper about the datasets null values (needs to be checked in old Delphi versions)
  - ADDED support for boolean values in datasets serialization
  - ADDED unit tests about Mapper and dataset fields nullability
  - The current version is available in constant ```DMVCFRAMEWORK_VERSION``` defined in ```MVCFramework.Commons.pas```

## Samples and documentation
DMVCFramework is provided with a lot of examples focused on specific functionality.
All samples are in [Samples](samples) folder.
Check the [DMVCFramework Developer Guide](https://danieleteti.gitbooks.io/delphimvcframework/content/) (work in progress).


# Getting Started
Below the is a basic sample of a DMVCFramework server wich can be deployed as standa-alone application, as an Apache module or as ISAPI dll. This flexibility is provided by the Delphi WebBroker framework (built-in in Delphi since Delphi 4).
The project containes an IDE Expert which make creating DMVCFramework project a breeze. However not all the Delphi version are supported, so here's the manual version (which is not complicated at all).

To create this server, you have to create a new ```Delphi Projects -> WebBroker -> WebServerApplication```. Then add the following changes to the webmodule.
```delphi
unit WebModuleUnit1;

interface

uses System.SysUtils, System.Classes, Web.HTTPApp, MVCFramework {this unit contains TMVCEngine class};

type
  TWebModule1 = class(TWebModule)
    procedure WebModuleCreate(Sender: TObject);
    procedure WebModuleDestroy(Sender: TObject);

  private
    MVC: TMVCEngine;

  public
    { Public declarations }
  end;

var
  WebModuleClass: TComponentClass = TWebModule1;

implementation

{$R *.dfm}

uses UsersControllerU; //this is the unit where is defined the controller

procedure TWebModule1.WebModuleCreate(Sender: TObject);
begin
  MVC := TMVCEngine.Create(Self);
  MVC.Config[TMVCConfigKey.DocumentRoot] := 'public_html'; //if you need some static html, javascript, etc (optional)
  MVC.AddController(TUsersController); //see next section to know how to create a controller
end;

procedure TWebModule1.WebModuleDestroy(Sender: TObject);
begin
  MVC.Free;
end;

end.
```

Remember that the files inside the redist folder *must* be in the executable path or in the system path. If starting the server whithin the IDE doesn't works, try to run the executable outside the IDE and check the dependencies.
That's it! You have just created your first DelphiMVCFramework. Now you have to add a controller to respond to the http request.

## Sample Controller
Below a basic sample of a DMVCFramework controller with 2 action

```delphi
unit UsersControllerU;
  
interface
  
uses 
  MVCFramework;
 
type 
   [MVCPath('/users')]
   TUsersController = class(TMVCController)
   public

    //The following action will be with a GET request like the following
    //http://myserver.com/users/3
    [MVCPath('/($id)')]
    [MVCProduces('application/json')]
    [MVCHTTPMethod([httpGET])]
    [MVCDoc('Returns a user as a JSON object')]
    procedure GetUser(id: Integer);

    
    //The following action will be with a GET request like the following
    //http://myserver.com/users
    [MVCPath('/')]
    [MVCProduces('application/json')]
    [MVCHTTPMethod([httpGET])]
    [MVCDoc('Returns the users list as a JSON Array of JSON Objects')]
    procedure GetUsers;

    //The following action will be with a PUT request like the following
    //http://myserver.com/users/3
    //and in the request body there should be a serialized TUser
    [MVCPath('/($id)')]
    [MVCProduce('application/json')]
    [MVCHTTPMethod([httpPUT])]
    [MVCDoc('Update a user')]    
    procedure UpdateUser(id: Integer);

    //The following action will respond to a POST request like the following
    //http://myserver.com/users
    //and in the request body there should be the new user to create as json
    [MVCPath]
    [MVCProduce('application/json')]
    [MVCHTTPMethod([httpPOST])]
    [MVCDoc('Create a new user, returns the id of the new user')]
    procedure CreateUser;

  end;
 
implementation

uses
  MyTransactionScript; //contains actual data access code
  
{ TUsersController }

procedure TUsersController.GetUsers;
var
  Users: TObjectList<TUser>;
begin
  Users := GetUsers;
  Render(Users);
end;
 
procedure TUsersController.GetUser(id: Integer);
var
  User: TUser;
begin
  User := GetUserById(id);
  Render(User);
end;

procedure TUsersController.UpdateUser(id: Integer);
var
  User: TUser;
begin
  User := Context.Request.BodyAs<TUser>;
  UpdateUser(id, User);
  Render(User);
end;	
  
procedure TUsersController.CreateUser;
var
  User: TUser;
begin
  User := Context.Request.BodyAs<TUser>;
  CreateUser(User);
  Render(User);
end;	
  
end.
```

Now you have a performant RESTful server wich respond to the following URLs:
- GET /users/($id)		(eg. /users/1, /users/45 etc)
- PUT /users/($id)		(eg. /users/1, /users/45 etc with the JSON data in the request body)
- POST /users			(the JSON data must be in the request body)

### Quick Creation of DelphiMVCFramework Server

If you dont plan to deploy your DMVCFramework server behind a webserver (apache or IIS) you can also pack more than one listener application server into one single executable. In this case, the process is a bit different and involves the creation of a listener context. However, create a new server is a simple task:

```delphi
uses
  MVCFramework.Server,
  MVCFramework.Server.Impl;

var
  LServerListener: IMVCListener;
begin
  LServerListener := TMVCListener.Create(TMVCListenerProperties.New
	 .SetName('Listener1')
	 .SetPort(5000)
	 .SetMaxConnections(1024)
	 .SetWebModuleClass(YourServerWebModuleClass)
   );  

  LServerListener.Start;
  LServerListener.Stop;
end;
```

If you want to add a layer of security (in its WebModule you should add the security middleware):

```delphi
uses
  MVCFramework.Server,
  MVCFramework.Server.Impl,
  MVCFramework.Middleware.Authentication;

procedure TTestWebModule.WebModuleCreate(Sender: TObject);
begin
  FMVCEngine := TMVCEngine.Create(Self);
	
  // Add Yours Controllers
  FMVCEngine.AddController(TYourController);
	
  // Add Security Middleware
  FMVCEngine.AddMiddleware(TMVCBasicAuthenticationMiddleware.Create(
    TMVCDefaultAuthenticationHandler.New
    .SetOnAuthentication(
		procedure(const AUserName, APassword: string;
		  AUserRoles: TList<string>; var IsValid: Boolean; 
		  const ASessionData: TDictionary<String, String>)
		begin
		  IsValid := AUserName.Equals('dmvc') and APassword.Equals('123');
		end
		)
    ));
end;  
```

In stand alone mode you can work with a context that supports multiple listeners servers:

```delphi
uses
  MVCFramework.Server,
  MVCFramework.Server.Impl;

var
  LServerListenerCtx: IMVCListenersContext;

begin
  LServerListenerCtx := TMVCListenersContext.Create;

  LServerListenerCtx.Add(TMVCListenerProperties.New
    .SetName('Listener1')
    .SetPort(6000)
    .SetMaxConnections(1024)
    .SetWebModuleClass(WebModuleClass1)
    );

  LServerListenerCtx.Add(TMVCListenerProperties.New
    .SetName('Listener2')
    .SetPort(7000)
    .SetMaxConnections(1024)
    .SetWebModuleClass(WebModuleClass2)
    );

  LServerListenerCtx.StartAll;
end;  
```

### Links
Feel free to ask questions on the "Delphi MVC Framework" facebook group (https://www.facebook.com/groups/delphimvcframework).